By Tess Reidy
It is a hot May afternoon in Portsmouth, and a contempt of court hearing is taking place. After splitting up in 2023, the parents initially shared custody of the now two and three-year-old boys, with the father having them every other weekend. Since then, the mother has stopped contact, and there are allegations of stalking and sexual assault against the father, as well as coercive controlling behaviour during the relationship. There is also an alleged assault by the father on one of the boys. The mother and children have been moved twice with help from a domestic abuse worker, she says, due to his threatening behaviour. The father is currently on bail.
After the mother refused contact, it was agreed by both parents through the courts last year that the father would see the children at a supervised contact centre a few weekends a month. This was meant to begin in March 2024, but we are here today because not a single session has taken place. The mother has cancelled every time.
Unfortunately, there is a chaotic start to proceedings. A qualified legal representative (QLR) is required in cases such as this, where litigants in person (the father in this case, the mother has legal representation) are not cross-examined by the perpetrator or alleged perpetrator of their abuse and vice versa. But the QLR has not shown up. It transpires he is on a plane and did not inform the court. The judge is not pleased. With a shortage of lawyers signing up to the scheme since it was introduced in 2022, instances such as this are common and undoubtedly creating more adjournments, delays and wasted costs and resources to an already struggling court system.
To make matters worse, there is no proper court bundle. The documents are in a randomised order and no one has the first idea who has seen what evidence. The guardian’s position is that a full copy of all the papers is needed to allow someone to get their head around this case. Again, the judge is visibly annoyed.
Police delays are also not helping. There is one outstanding and live criminal investigation, and the father’s bail has been extended for a further three months due to police backlogs. It is clear, says the judge, that an effective hearing cannot take place as it would not be fair or proper to proceed.
Nevertheless, the judge begins by reading out the missed supervised weekend contact sessions. Three dates in March. Another three in April. Missed sessions in May. More in August. Each one comes with a reason and some with evidence: a hospital admission, a suggestion of the following Monday (the father declined, as he says works on weekdays), chicken pox, a holiday, the child’s mental health, the suggestion that the contact centre is not suitable to meet one of the children’s medical needs. The list goes on. By September, the mother had made it clear she would not take the children to the contact centre at all due to the advice she said she was given by the police, her health visitor and a domestic abuse support worker. Although unsupervised contact was initially allowed by the mother the mother’s barrister reminds the court that victims of domestic abuse do not always immediately recognise coercive and controlling behaviour in a relationship, and she now sees the father as a risk to the children. The father shakes his head.
So, in the end, not a single contact session took place, and the sessions stopped being booked altogether. Is this contempt of court? If it is proven that the mother has breached the order without reasonable excuse (there is evidence, for example, of the hospital trip and a planned holiday and possibly others), there is a whole array of sanctions available to the court. When the missed sessions are listed so matter of factly, it certainly does not make a strong case for the mother complying with the original court order.
Whatever the truth, there will be no resolution on this today. One of the sad things about this case, as the judge points out, is that there has been no real progress at all in two years, and today is a stark reminder of that. Yet this is partly due to the sclerotic nature of the court, with not enough QLR’s available, bundles not prepared properly, evidence not seen by all parties, plus, of course, police backlogs. This case cannot move forward any time soon. For the mother, that means a contempt of court proceeding hanging over her head. For the father, there is no contact with his children whatsoever. In the background to this, though, are two very young boys who seemingly need a court to carefully sort out their living arrangements going forward.
So it concludes, with more deadlines for documents, another court date set and a reminder from the judge that this is not fair on the parties, and it certainly is not fair on the children.
Published on 20th May 2025
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